Wor;d Bank economist: India needs to reduce damages caused by climate change

Xinhua: India needs to take action now at multiple levels of government to reduce the mounting damages caused by climate change to its agriculture, a World Bank environmental economist said here on Saturday. "Climate variability and climate change are resulting in a more severe occurrence of extreme events, such as droughts, floods and cyclones, which affect the poor most, and jeopardize agricultural production and livelihoods of rural communities," said Richard Damania, the World Bank economist.

He said the impacts of climate change on countries like India are significant as about 20 percent of India's Gross Domestic Product is attributable to the agriculture sector, which also employs 57 percent of the total workforce. Damania said he is looking at options to tackle the problem of "adaptation" to climate change in selected climate hotspots in India.

He said the incomes on the small rain-fed farms in Andhra Pradesh, central India, could decline by 5 percent under modest climate change and by over 20 percent under harsher conditions, increasing poverty among peasants….

A kiwi fruit farm in Himachal Pradesh, India. Shot by Achiwiki356, Wikimedia Commons